“TURN” COATES & WILSON

Hat Tip to Steve Fair @ http://stevefair.blogspot.com

Weekly Opinion/Editorial

“TURN” COATES & WILSON
by Steve Fair

Last week, two common sense bills passed the State House overwhelmingly but were killed in the Senate. One bill would have made English the official language of Oklahoma. Aided by Senator Harry “Turn” Coates, R-Seminole, the Senate Democrats were successful in sending SB 163 to conference by a vote of 25 to 23. That action will likely kill the bill this session. State Representative Randy Terrill, R-Moore, was the House author of the bill, which would have prevented state government from being compelled to deliver any services in languages other than English. Evidently, it got pretty heated at the Capital last week. Allegedly, Terrill and State Senator Patrick Anderson, R- Enid, had a heated exchange in which radio personality R.D. Mercer’s terminology was invoked by Terrill toward Anderson. Cooler heads have prevailed and the two Republicans have patched things up.

Coates is the real story. The Senator has been on the wrong side of several issues this session- most dealing with immigration. Coates is a building contractor who has brought into the concept that America must have illegals to work or the country will not survive. The Senator’s situational ethics have him voting with the Democrats often. Coates doesn’t appear to grasp the concept of “illegal.” Clearly, there is a major illegal immigration problem in America. Granted Congress should be dealing with it, but at least our state legislature had the courage to pass legislation that denies illegals taxpayer funded benefits. Coates’ stand on the rule of law is a clear contradiction to the Republican parties’ stand on immigration.

The second bill the Democrats killed was the Voter ID bill. Senate Bill # 1150 died when Senate Pro-Tem Mike Morgan, D-Stillwater, would not cast a vote. The vote was 24-23 in favor of the bill with Morgan abstained. Because it takes 25 votes to pass the Senate, the bill died. If Morgan would have voted with the Dems, the vote would have been tied and Lt. Governor Jari Askins would have broken the tie. Morgan said, “If you disenfranchise poor, minority, and elderly voters, you can hurt Democrats. This is what this bill is all about.” The bill would have required a voter to present either their driver license, a passport, state id card, a copy of their utility bill, a bank statement, a government check, or a government document with their name on it before they were given a ballot. Surely there is not a person alive who votes that could not produce one of the above-mentioned documents. Maybe alive is the issue? Voter ID is not a partisan issue. If the Democrats want fair, principled elections- and surely they do- what’s the big deal? Their resistance to such a fundamental common sense bill should raise red flags with Oklahoma citizens. You can’t cash a check without an ID. You can’t fly on a plane without an ID. You can’t buy cigarettes or booze without an ID. We can’t get medical treatment without an ID, but in Oklahoma you can vote without an ID.

One of the most bizarre statements on the Voter ID issue came from Senator Jim Wilson, D-Tahlequah, who said, “Voter identification has always been a Republican thing. It gives them as much as a 3 percent advantage.” Where did Wilson get those numbers? His statement doesn’t seem plausible. How does requiring an ID to vote automatically help Republicans? Wilson’s statement reveals he has little respect for his party’s voters. Or perhaps the Senator meant three percent of the Democrats currently voting in Oklahoma couldn’t produce a valid ID to match the name they are voting for? Who knows what Wilson meant, but making Voter ID a partisan issue is a stretch and doesn’t speak well for an elected official. On the TV show, Tool Time, Tim’s neighbor was named Wilson, a guy whose face was obscured- usually by his fence- the entire series. You never saw his entire face. Wilson was never positively identified on the series. He seemed to want to hide his true identity. Could that Wilson now be in the Oklahoma State Senate?

Seriously, one of the reasons Oklahoma is a poor state is due to the lack of leadership in our state government the first one hundred years. Until 2004, the Democrats had complete control of the legislature, but in 2004, Oklahoma voters gave Republicans the State House and it’s likely in November the GOP will take the State Senate. Even with the recent trend of the Oklahoma state legislature going Republican, Senate Dems are not going gentle into that good night. That’s why when they kill good bills for no apparent reason, there is a reason and the motivation is not in the taxpayer’s best interest.